Legends of Tomorrow The Chicago Way Review

The CW‘s Legends of Tomorrow: Season 2, Episode 8: The Chicago Way throws a mid-series final curve ball that no one saw coming.

But first, before we drop the bomb that makes January 24th really far away, let’s recap things post-invasion.

Damien Darkh (Neal McDonough), Eobard Thawne (Matt Letscher), and Malcolm Meryln (John Barrowman) team up with Al Capone in 1927 Chicago. The three give Capone a heads up that Eliot Ness, a Prohibition agent is in town and that he’ll play a part in his downfall.

The Legends appear just in time before history is changed forever. But the team also has to find Capone’s ledger in order to secure history happens accordingly.

Nate Heywood (Nick Zano) and Ray Palmer (Brandon Routh) are in the midsts of a weird sibling rivalry that seems like a plot ploy to make Nate more integrated into the team. I’m not buying it but if it builds up to something else, so be it.

In order to protect Ness, Nate takes his place as the team tries to corner Darkh. Right around this time, Mick (Dominic Purcell) starts to hallucinate visions of his dead partner Snart (Wentworth Miller). This is probably a personification of his doubts about his place among the Legends. Snart keeps bringing up that fact that in his heart of hearts Mick is a criminal and this whole new life is bound to get him killed. Whether or not this odd cameo moment is meant to highlight Mick’s desire to go back to bad or not isn’t clear. But it does push Mick’s character for the better. This is a bit of throwback to Amaya (Maisie Richardson-Sellers) encouraging Mick to own his feelings instead of letting them own him.

Mick decides to handle the situation his way: as a criminal. This bonds Amaya in him in a way that makes them, dare we say it, friends. In a later scene, he refers to them as Bonnie and Clyde which was just really almost too cute.

When the Legends finally make a plan to get one over on the evil Three Musketeers, Eobarb snatches Sara Lance (Caity Lotz) and Martin Stein (Victor Garber). Malcolm shares with Sara that they want the amulet that the Legends snagged in an earlier episode. Malcolm offers her the years of her life she lost, and her sister in exchange for the amulet. But Sara has matured so much in a short amount of time that she declines the offer.

This is a big deal for Stein. He is awkwardly feeling guilty about his secret Abberation daughter that he advertently got his younger self to have. After Sara credits Stein for being the reason for not accepting the offer he finally tells Sara about Lily.

Malcolm returns to where Stein and Sara are being held and threatens torture. But instead of grabbing Sara he turns his sights on Stein. Sara is then forced to listen to Stein’s screams as Eobarb jabs a device into Stein.

Eventually, the Legends finally show up to free Sara and Stein. But Stein is acting weird and the only person who really notices is, Jax (Franz Drameh), obviously. He quickly discovers Stein is really Eobarb looking for the amulet. Eobarb manages to overcome the Legends. This allows Capone and his gang to enter the ship and start a firefight on the Waverider. Things look bleak until Sara makes a trade of the amulet for Stein.

Eobarb activates the amulet it reveals a map to the Spear of Destiny that has the ability to re-write history.

The scene cuts to a man that looks a lot like Rip Hunter (Arthur Darvill) running as someone shoots at him. Before we’re able to get excited for the return of Rip Hunter it is revealed the alleged Rip Hunter is an actor. The whole scene is a movie set. However, the real shock is that the director of the scene is Rip Hunter! Who doesn’t have a British accent?

Did Rip Hunter willingly giving up his life as a Legend to be a movie director? Let’s hope not. With any luck, the return of Rip Hunter will provide the necessary kick in the pants this series greatly needs.

About the author

Eming Piansay

**Fired for illegally republishing FilmBook articles on another website**

Emilya is a writer from San Francisco. She went to S.F. State for her undergraduate degree in Journalism, and she also holds an MFA in film editing. She’s the former managing editor of YO! Youth Outlook Multimedia. Currently, she manages the literary blog Tea & Fiction.